O Atirador Fantasma

Some performances not so good, one or two special effects could be better, quite a bit of corny dialog. Would have been really good if not for those things. Well worth watching as long as you don't take it seriously and you like action movies with lots of shooting and blood. Some reviewers have said some of the things would never happen like that. They probably didn't like Die Hard either.

I watched this on a bootleg site that was all written in Arabic. The copy of the DVD had Arabic subtitles. I couldn't help wondering how that audience receives a movie like this, let alone do they enjoy watching it? Maybe they don't care, they just pirate the movies and make their money.

Anyway, I've been out of the "Sniper" loop since about the second one (What are we on now? 12?) so I needed to do a little catching up. I have to say that this wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Sure the visual fx were pretty cheesy and the dialog was, at times, embarrassing. But over all it far surpassed anything Steven Seagal has done in the last decade or so (with the possible exception of The Cockpuncher) So, in doing a little research I discovered that just about anyone associated with these films is either trying to get a career started or pretending their career isn't yet over.

There was, in fact some decent acting. You can tell a good actor when he delivers the cheesiest line in a way that almost makes you believe him (or her)

But the one overlying factor was that whenever Dennis Haysbert was on screen I kept expecting him to say, "That's Allstate's stand. Are you in good hands?"

So, i was disappointed that they didn't say how the enemy got the equipment.. was kind of expecting that. Like if that was the main thing holding up the story you think they would talk about how the breach happened and what they did to fix it.

Also this requires a minimum amount of characters in order to leave a review, so allow me to use the rest of the space as a fill-in. Thank you for taking the time to read my review, and I hope it finds you in good spirits. This movie was good but overall I would not watch it again as pieces of the plot could have been addressed better. But the actors did well.

As former military, I'm particular about realism. Although this movie had it's share of cinematic liberty, for a sniper movie, it was actually quite good. As soon as I saw "Billy Zane" in the opening credits, I groaned a little. He has matured quite a bit since "Sniper"...plus, they didn't play up the role of GMSgt "Gunny" Beckett too much (the lead role is his son, Brandon Beckett), so that made it less like a sequel and more like a continuing story line. It was just a good, action-packed "heavy on the sniper action" flick. If you like military movies, specifically sniper movies, you'll enjoy it. You won't say it's the best sniper movie ever, but you'll watch it to the end without puking.

Not as good as Shooter (Mark Wahlberg), not as good as the original Sniper (Tom Berenger), but a darn close third place, with every other sniper movie falling way behind IMHO. A little too much cheese at times, but countered with some slightly comedic moments (the Russian talking about John McClane from Die Hard...yippie-ki-yay, MF'er, etc). It had it's snicker moments for sure, but pretty much action-packed from beginning to end, which I love.

Overall, a definite watch. Maybe not a "keep forever and watch again and again", but unless you're one of those people who want to dissect cinematography (really well done here), or the director's mood or previous works and how it compares, you'll enjoy it for what it is. Lots of sniper shots, lots of "Semper Fi" moments, and just a decent movie. I'd watch it again, but not anytime soon.

A fair supporting cast doing a mediocre job for a very stiff main carachter.

The" love" interest angle was awful as it didn't make sense as does part of the plot but you realize the reason for the 1st half while watching the rest of it. It was just poorly planned, or written and directed. It fought itself.

The movie only comes together during the 2nd half, if you get that far, as technically the gunplay doesn't make sense either, that is if you have any military or police experience, so make sure to turn off your brain (or have a very strong alcoholic beverage so you don't care.) Remember to turn on the 'closed caption' at the beginning otherwise you won't get any of the dialog as the loud ethnic music drowns out the speaking parts and you spend most of the movie thinking 'wtf did he just say?' Oh, and the main carachter speaks with clenched teeth which doesn't help his dialog and it comes off forced and uncharismatic, instead of tough. Haysbert and Zane, and the foreign counterpart assigned to the team are what hold the film together but I couldn't refrain from thinking throughout the whole thing that I could have been watching reruns of "the unit" and had a better time.